Site Mobile Navigation

Move to Reclaim Rail Line Receives Bipartisan Push

City officials put aside partisan differences yesterday to forcefully push an ambitious proposal that would transform an elevated rail line spanning 20 blocks on Manhattan's West Side from an antiquated eyesore into a lush park.

The passionate appeals by City Council Speaker Gifford Miller and representatives of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, normally political adversaries, were viewed by park advocates as a major step forward for a plan that, in less than two years, has gone from half-baked to cooked enough to require the involvement of lawyers.

''We believe we can turn this space into one of New York's great places,'' said Deputy Mayor Daniel L. Doctoroff. ''This is the spine, truly the vital link, that connects three rapidly evolving and exciting neighborhoods.''

Mr. Miller called the proposed 1.6-mile elevated greenway a ''signature development'' for New York unlike any other rail-bed reclamation project in the country.

''It is such a creative, thoughtful and exciting possibility that it's just unthinkable that we could not seize this,'' he said.

Though dramatic, the remarks were delivered at a hearing before an obscure federal transportation panel whose mission is far more mundane: namely, to untangle a raft of legal issues that have kept the fate of the 69-year-old railroad viaduct, known as the High Line, in limbo for more than a decade.

The panel, the Surface Transportation Board, is not expected to issue any rulings for at least a month. The project, which by some estimates could cost $65 million, would still face years of design planning, regulatory approvals and development.

A rusting incongruity, the High Line is a hulking relic when viewed from below, its promise revealed only when one ascends its verdant deck of tall native grasses and wildflowers that have taken hold since the trains stopped running in the early 1980's. It emerges from a rail yard at 34th Street and runs about 30 feet above sidewalk level south to Greenwich Village, where it ends at Gansevoort Street.

In 1992, a coalition of property owners along the corridor, arguing that the old railway was a hazardous eyesore and an impediment to redevelopment, won federal backing for a plan to tear it down, a proposal later supported by Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani. However, the plan never materialized because the coalition and the railroad's owner at the time, Conrail, could not agree on an ultimate price tag for demolition.

Conrail's successor, the CSX Corporation, has not taken a stand publicly on the question of whether to preserve the High Line, but has suggested it would not object as long as the company's financial interests were protected.

As attempts to raze the rail line stalled, the once-far-fetched notion of revitalizing it steadily gathered steam, and Mr. Bloomberg, in a turn-about from his predecessor, embraced the concept. The Bloomberg administration envisions a transformed High Line as an engine for economic growth in the communities through which is passes.

All sides in the issue -- the preservationists, the neighbors who have favored demolition and the High Line's owner -- are now seeking guidance from the transportation board. Whatever decision the board makes may not be final, because the city has said it would move to block any attempt to demolish the High Line, setting the stage for a protracted battle in state court.

The city's change of heart regarding the future of the High Line was cause for bewilderment by the transportation board chairman, Roger Nober, who pressed officials on what had changed since 1992.

''Back then, elected officials were saying the High Line had to come down,'' Mr. Nober said during the hearing at 26 Federal Plaza. ''Why is it now in the public interest to maintain it?''